Last year I suffered a period of feeling completely unhappy in my own skin, panicking in social situations I regarded myself to be 'trapped' in. My breathing would become erratic and, as an asthmatic, this made me so uncomfortable that I began to limit when I would go out, and started cancelling on friends more frequently, in some ways isolating myself.
And then I suddenly had the realisation that unless I made changes, I was never going to achieve what I wanted to achieve. So I turned to simple little steps to calm myself down when I felt like I was on the verge of a panic attack. Of course, I'm not an expert, but this is what worked for me and hopefully what will work for you too. I've designed all of the steps to be simple and to not attract too much attention so that you can do them wherever you are - whether it's on the bus or on the train - perhaps in a space where you feel anxious due to lots of people.
I've made a graphic to show all of the steps - feel free to download the picture and keep it with you! The steps are as follows;
1). Inhale and exhale deeply five times. It also helps sometimes, if you are seated, with every breath you take to try and push deeper into the seat. Plant your feet firmly on the floor and make a strong footprint (i.e. have your thighs at 90 degrees to your shins). Push your feet firmly into the ground.
2). De-tense all of your muscles. If it helps, scrunch all of them up first - going from your toes upward. Scrunch up your face too - every bit of your body - curl your toes and make your hands into fists. Then, again from the toes upwards, let everything go gradually. You should feel a sort of weightlessness when you finish. If you still feel any areas are tense, just scrunch them up and unscrunch. While doing this, you could again repeat the previous practice of pushing further into the seat and making a stronger footprint with every muscle you de-tense.
3). Now focus on your hands. There are two options here - or you could do both for about 5 minutes each. The first is to just place your hands in your lap, one on top of the other. The other is to place one hand in your lap and the other, palm down, behind you. Breathe into whatever position you choose - if you want to close your eyes and try and zone out - this is especially effective if you are on the bus and you're anxious due to the other people around you - try and focus on yourself and just breathe - you will get through this!
4). Alternate nostril breathing. Okay now this is the weird sounding one but, believe me, it works. You should use your thumb and third finger for this exercise. Place your index finger on your forehead or wherever you think is your natural resting position. Press your left nostril first and breathe in deeply through your right nostril. Then swap to press down your right nostril and breathe out deeply through your left nostril. Reverse this to breathe in right and out left. Repeat as many times as necessary. You could again try breathing down into your seat or closing your eyes. Try and enter your own zone and focus entirely on the breathing, not the people around you or the panicking feelings. This little exercise has saved me from some really difficult situations, and I hope it will do the same for you.
5). Positive thoughts and positive visualisation. These exercises might work temporarily without total control over your mind, but in the long term, it's you who needs to overcome your own problem. Noone else can help you if you can't help yourself - you need to begin the process. Close your eyes if you feel that you can. If you're in a public place and are worried about being noticed, then keep your eyes open and just think. You need to see yourself calming down and overcoming this situation and getting out of it. You are totally capable - you need to calm yourself down. If you need to and physically can get out of the situation, get out of it, take a breather and, if necessary return. You are stronger than you think, believe me. Think of your dreams and ambitions - they are attainable if you can just re-gain control over yourself. Believe in yourself. You can do this!
Here is the graphic - download it, make it your background, whatever. If you use it on your website, it would be great if you could credit me though -
Again, I'm not an expert. But I have experienced the awful feeling that you just want to escape. You are not alone in this! If you ever need to chat to me, my door is always open. Approach me via my social networking platforms (see buttons at the side of the page). I hope that this has been a helpful post.
No comments:
Post a Comment